Rising digital revenues help New York Times offset losses in print sales

The New York Times Co reported a better-than-expected quarterly profit on the back of rising revenues from digital advertising, which helped the newspaper publisher offset losses in its print ad sales.

The New York Times Company (NYT ) reported that its third-quarter 2017 net income attributable to common stockholders spurted to $32.33 million from $4,06,000 last year. Earnings per share from continuing operations were $0.20 compared with $.00 in the same period of 2016.

Operating profit for the third quarter of 2017 was $33.0 million compared with $9.0 million in the same period of 2016, largely due to higher digital subscription revenues and lower severance costs, which more than offset lower print advertising revenues.

Adjusted operating profit was $56.5 million in the third quarter of 2017 compared with $39.2 million in the third quarter of 2016, on the back of by strong digital subscription revenues, which were partially offset by lower print advertising revenues.

The publisher said the company added about 154,000 paid subscribers to various websites, including that of The New York Times. At the end of the third quarter of 2017 paid digital-only subscriptions totaled approximately 2,487,000 a 59.1 per cent increase compared with the end of the third quarter of 2016.

Of the 154,000 additions, 105,000 came from the company's digital news products, while the remainder came from the company's other digital products.

Digital advertising revenue rose 11 per cent to $49.2 million, accounting for about 43 per cent of its total advertising revenue.

The paper's print advertising revenue fell 20.1 per cent to $64.4 million.

Net income attributable to the company rose to $32.3 million in the quarter ended Sept. 24 from $406,000 a year earlier. On a per-share basis it earned 20 cents per share compared with break-even last year.

Excluding items, earnings were 13 cents per share from continuing operations.

Revenue rose 6.1 per cent to $385.6 million.

However, NYT expects total advertising revenues in the fourth quarter of 2017 to decrease in the high single-digits compared with the fourth quarter of 2016. Operating costs and adjusted operating costs are expected to increase in the high-single digits in the fourth quarter of 2017 compared with the fourth quarter of 2016.